Neighbors

Last week a colony of sea lions moved in next door. A bull and his harem of five females reside on the small rock island off shore of our cliffside home. They fish all day and fuck all night. The females bark and bark, and the male grunts, snorts, and chuckles like a self satisfied halfwit. They keep me up much of the night, since the tent walls of our yurt admit sounds in and out freely. At times it even seems quieter outside.

This is the first time in my life that I find myself so close to wilderness that I am actually annoyed by it. It is curiously comforting because the annoyance seems to me a mile-stone in a relationship with the wild growing fuller. The mists of romance have cleared, or are clearing, and though my love of sea lion, stellar jay, and adolescent crow remain unconditional, I am not so smitten as to ignore their faults, follies, and intrusive calls.

We are a family after all, a family of animals, a family of living beings, and family members often wear upon each other’s last nerve. I pray nightly for a high tide to come and put the pinnipeds off their love-play, and sometimes other members of our family join in the exhausted campaign for peace and quiet. I’ve heard an otter mewing from the kelp bed over and over, perhaps saying: “I’m trying to sleep, I’m trying to sleep!” And even a bobcat shrieking from the cliffs: “I hunt with my ears, shut up, shut up!” It seems I am not the only fussy little brother in the clan.